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Friday, 6 February 2009

The Palestinian Center for the Defense of Prisoners confirmed that the Israeli occupation forces committed war crimes in a deliberate and planned way during its aggression “Operation Cast Lead” against the Gaza Strip, which lasted about 23 days.

The IOF executed Palestinians who were arrested from their houses in cold blood, either by shooting them directly by launching missiles and rockets at them. The Center reports that the testimonies of survivors of the assault on Gaza confirmed the status of the executions of these “prisoners of war”, and that the occupation forces violated the international war-crime treaties and conventions which clarify the rights of prisoners of armed conflicts. The testimonies confirm that the prisoners were executed a few kilometers away from their houses, and that there were among them children in some cases aged only months, women, and old men.

According to Maisa’a Fawzi Al-Samouni, aged 19, a Palestinian from the MIDEAST ISRAEL PALESTINIANS Al-Zeitoun neighborhood, the soldiers took her together with her daughter, aged nine months, and about thirty other persons of the Al-Samouni family, to the house of one of her relatives, Wael Al-Samouni, aged 40. The house of Wael is made of concrete, it has about two hundred square meters. According to Maisa’a, “first we were 30 persons, and then we became about 70 persons in Wael’s house. We were forced to stay in this house until the following day without water or food”. More